THE BIKERIDERS

Based on Danny Lyon’s 1968 photobook of the same name, The Bikeriders follows biker gang Vandal MC between the years of 1965 and 1973.

It’s rare that you see a film based on a photo book. Generally it would need something with a little more narrative to pull you through.

But here, it feels appropriate.

Because The Bikeriders feels less interested in telling a taut story, and more interested in just capturing an era. Taking a group of people and exploring how they ended up where they did. Documenting them. Preserving them in time, in the same way the Danny Lyon’s book did nearly 60 years ago.

And I think The Bikeriders is at its best when it goes all in on this idea. Where Danny (Mike Faist) just documents. When he listens to his subjects tell stories. Some of which aren’t relevant to the relatively thin narrative, but are relevant to each character as individuals. Who they are. And why the are who they are. 

One moment that illustrates this perfectly, and one of my favourite scenes in the film, is of Michael Shannons Zipco recounting the tale of his failed interview for the armed forces. The story itself is superfluous to the plot. We don’t even hear the end of it as we move to another scene before it finishes. 

But it tells us so much about the character. It tells us everything about the character. His regret and his anger. His “outsider” outlook. His longing for the family he has found in The Vandals.

Shannon is, as he often is, electric in these moments.

Where Lyons is our documenter, Kathy (Jodie Comer) acts as our narrator. Stitching each vignette together with stories and background of her own. We follow the gang, and see them, through her eyes, and through her memories. Is she an unreliable narrator? Perhaps. Benny (Austin Butler) is descried early on as someone dangerous. A bit crazy. But we rarely see this in the film. Perhaps because of Kathy’s obvious love and affection for him. But this is her story. Her memories. And she will tell it her way.

Jodie Comer excels in these moments. She is utterly captivating. A powerhouse and she takes each story and runs with it. Almost a stream of consciousness flowing out of her. 

The trailer for The Bikeriders is, I think, misrepresentative of what the film. There is a whole lot less action than I expected there to be, as the film take a slower scenic route. But where we do have bursts of action it is brutal and powerful, with moments that made me wince, and elicited groans from the audience I was in the cinema with.

And the fact that the film is slower, and that these moments aren’t as common as you might expect, makes them even ore powerful. These people who we spend the film with, people who have families and children - one of these moments actually coming at a family picnic - are capable of awful acts of violence.

Leader of the gang, Johnny (Tom Hardy), epitomises this. Ostensibly a family man. Someone who cares deeply for those around him. He is fairly softly spoken and level headed. But when provoked can decimate everything around him. Anyone who has wronged him.

The Bikeriders may not have been what I thought I was getting. But the more I think about it, I’m pleased about that. It’s pacing allows room for the performances to breathe, and there are some great performances her, led by the excellent Jodie comer.

It would have been all to easy for the filmmakers to focus on the action and the violence, but by focussing instead on the people it is documenting it has become something infinitely more memorable.